Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-04-12
TRAIN ROBBERS.
ontinued from First PAGE.

to display red light at the Second ave-
nue. crossing and sidetrack the trains as
they came in. This was so quickly exc
cuted that when the thieving crew mus
tered onto the little platform to ask what
the red light meant, they could see glis-
tening on the wrists of each other the
fearful implements of Justice by
which the officers gathered them together.
The conductor and brakemen looked
aghast at each other as the guilty knowl
edge of their crimes came before them.
Train after train was side-tracked until
the alleged thieves were pulled and the
caboOse cars containing many evidences
of their long continued depredations were
cut loose and searched. The combination
to rob a freight train necessItated
q guilty knowledge and the actual partici-
patton of the conductor, the middle
brakeman and one or more head and rear
brakemen or fagmen. 1t did not of
necessity take in the front brakeman or
the fagman or the engineer or flremep,
but the others had to be in to make it
work, and it did work. 1t was not re-
CURED that they should wreck the trains
to rob them. They were finer fingered
operators than that. They were
no mere gatherers of scat
tered goods like the mob who
carried off the hams at the riots, not
they. Every excuse which the conduc-
tors knew could not well be denied was
given for the broken cars
when they neglected, which they
frequently did, to seal or lock
them up again. Government bonded
cars were broken perhaps oftener than
ordinary Union Line or common freight
cars. In these they always knew they
could get choice goods, silks, cigars, rifles,
all kinds of imported firearms and cad
dies of tobacco seemed to become of
their necessities. Boxes of shaWls and
the general run of merchant supplies for
every day use were found open in the
cabOose cars of each train. Hun
dreds of boxes which had contained
the finest imported cigars were
found on these trains, boldly used
by the men to hold their caps and over
alIs and lanterns and waste stuff. So
bold had they become that the United
States regulations, strict as they are,
bad lost all terror for them.
While the customs officers were trying to
trace the goods and the merchants here
and elsewhere corresponding with ship
pers and special agents at special pay
were wondering how this could possibly
be and were loading down letters
and books with theories which
flew around as indefinite as smoke, the
operators smoked their habanas within
the very shadow of the court of the Gus
tom-hOuse and laughed at their masters
who suffered the loss. Fires were in
progress to-day along the lire of the
Panhandle road, made up of stuff
rid out of the CabOose cars, that evidence
of things not seen may be wanting when
the trial comes. Word was telegraphed
al! along the road for particulars Of each
case. Freight trains have haHled
up at the water stations and
delay made until the caboose wasS
swept, and il doing so evidence has
been procured against unsupported rail
road men which it will be
hard to overcurn. Almost every
man arrested had from one
TO two pawn tickets for all sorts of arti-
Giles on his person. 1t is alleged that
every pawn shop in the two cities is rep
resented on the tickets. An amount
of several thousand dollars is
said to be recoverable in this way
alone. About the Panhandle yards
to-day there was a scene of quietness
that indicated that something unusual
had happened, where there is usually a.
scene of noisy hustle. The crews of
men that had been arrested
had left a large number of trains
deserted. There were twenty-four of
these trains piled closely together on the
side tracks in the yards. The detention
of freight, however, is only
temporary. The railroad officers had
taken special precaution to continue
the moving of their freight promptly.
An extra force of sixty men had been
employed. These were put on the de
serted trains in place of the arrested
employees. When it became generally
known that q larger number of men had
been arrested, applicants for positions
commenced to flock into the depot by